


Essence of Kerosene

by Lobelia321



Category: SGA.
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-04-19
Updated: 2006-04-19
Packaged: 2017-10-18 03:13:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/184373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lobelia321/pseuds/Lobelia321





	Essence of Kerosene

_**FIC: "Essence of Kerosene", an SGA off-the-cuff writing experiment**_  
I know I planned this whole other thing but what the hey. Here's something off the cuff instead.

Title: Essence of Kerosene  
Author: Lobelia  
Fandom: SGA.  
Category: Off-the-cuff writing experiment.  
Rating: Mild yet wild.  
Spoilers: 2.05, 'Condemned'.  
Length: c. 1,000 words  
Pairing: Eldon / Rodney McKay  
For those gentle readers not familiar with this fandom: Who are these people? Answer: Who cares, writing experiment, slash, whee! Pics: [ Eldon the Olesian](http://www.gateworld.net/omnipedia/characters/graphics/eldon.jpg). [ Rodney McKay](http://emesire.free.fr/img/img1153.jpg).  
Warnings: Random stylistic criteria. Self-infliction of prose straitjackets, and then cheerful abandonment of same.

 **omniscient narrator, multiple pov, formal language**

Eldon the Olesian from one of the inhabited planets of the Pegasus Galaxy rarely ceased speaking. He was particularly fond of orating over meals. Indeed, at times his food remained untouched upon his plate while his tongue wagged incessantly as he disburthened himself of not only his life's history but also of all the minutiae of his many exploits in the realm of low-technology engineering and mechanics.

Dr Rodney McKay from the only inhabited planet in the Milky Way rarely ceased speaking except when partaking of food and climaxing (although the latter fact was only known to a handful of fellow-planetarians). He also rarely ceased to be irritated by Eldon the Olesian's penchant for interminable chatter.

  
 **objective effect, nobody's pov, external description, techno-lingo**

Dr McKay bent over the turbo-compressor and rotated the fuel maintenance valve by two-and-a-half degrees.

Eldon watched McKay over McKay's shoulder.

Dr McKay stretched up to adjust the petrochemical maintenance panel.

Eldon watched McKay over McKay's shoulder.

Dr McKay swore when the counter-corrosion applicator fell onto his foot, causing minor swelling in the region of the peroneal tibial.

Eldon stammered, "I... I think the p... the panel valve needed to be two degrees to the left... I mean, to the left."

"What?" snapped Dr McKay, cradling his aching ankle.

Eldon pointed to the panel valve.

Dr McKay dropped the ankle to the floor and frowned at the valve.

  
 **subjective effect, pov McKay**  
'O my gosh,' thought McKay. This was too weird. But impressive. Very impressive.

"Just goes to show," McKay said to nobody in particular, "what the mind will come up with, irrespective of the technological advances of the culture. Of course, it helps to have those advances. Mind and matter, and all that."

That strange Olesian. He should wash sometime, though.

  
 **subjective effect, pov Eldon**  
Eldon still cowered every time one of the Atlantean doors hissed open in front of him. The blinking lights on the consoles disturbed him, and the bubbles spurting around in those tall glass columns startled him. It had been too long since he'd been in any kind of built environment. All he had known for these past years had been the forest and the earth and the threatening sky.

Him crouched in the nethermost hut, tinkering with discarded spaceship bits.

McKay, though. He knew everything.

  
 **McKay's thoughts**  
What's he doing? Why's he staring at me like that with those shiny eyes? "Are you sure you've adjusted to the Atlantean illumination system yet? Because those dilations, you should have them looked at. They can give you drops for that. I had conjunctivitis once, it played havoc with my optical nerves."

  
 **Eldon's thoughts**  
I have no idea what he's talking about but if I listen long enough I am sure I will learn how to construct a hydraulic leverage arm.

  
 **Clipped sentences, metaphor of setting**  
Dr McKay sat on the bench. Eldon joined him. McKay cast him a short glance. The lamp sputtered. "It's the gene", said McKay.

Circles of air wavered across the interval.

  
 **What the heck, romantic ending**  
"It's the... the noumenal vaporiser," said Eldon.

"What? What are you talking about?" said Dr McKay.

"Here, the... I don't know, all I did was to calib... calibrate the... " Eldon lifted the device. A green lamp blinked.

"Calibrate the hydro-terminator, yes, yes, I see that," said Dr McKay, "it's quite, yes." He peered at the lamp, ran his finger around the thread of the washer, licked the liquid off the tip of his pinkie. "Petroleum?" he said. "Kerosene?"

"Carbonic," said Eldon.

"Yes, yes, that's it!" McKay stabbed the air. "Carbonic resin compound! Ingenious."

"Really?"

"Really what?"

Eldon who was half a head shorter than Dr McKay and a good deal grimier stood on tiptoes and kissed his lab mate.

After a while, he stopped kissing his lab mate. But continued to stand on wobbling tiptoes.

"Good gosh," said Dr McKay. "Can you do that again?"

Eldon obliged.

The green lamp turned orange.

Dr McKay, still caught in the kiss, threw his pupils into the corners of his eyes in order to check the lamp's doings.

The orange lamp turned red.

"Amazing!" cried Dr McKay, leaving Eldon's tongue without a home. "This is incredible! There must be something..." Waving the hands. "... some sort of enzyme, we've got to get the biologists onto this." Wiggling the fingers. "Perhaps some saliva compound? That activates the gene and then transfers itself onto the... the what?"

"I... I did not..."

"What? You had no idea this was going to happen?" And, 'o my gosh', he thought, 'what did that crazy Olesian kiss me for, in that case?'

  
 **metaphor of setting**  
There were a hundred different humming noises in the engineering laboratory of the Ancient City of Atlantis. Their frequencies ranged from beyond-the-bat to seven-fathoms-below-zero. Some would have made bees mate except there were no bees on Atlantis. Others would have made elks roar except, of course, as above.

The frequency emitted by the as-yet-unidentified device with The Green Lamp hovered somewhere between vanilla and Purcell.

Some would call it an aphrodisiac.

  
 **metaphor of body**  
Others wouldn't call it anything.

They would simply exchange salivary matter, at first in experimental burrowings, parcelling it out like a handover of spies. Then in deeper, tongues searching, scooping out hidden cavities.

The more they delved, the louder glowed the lamp.

McKay kept one hand on the ignition button, feeling it hum against his palm like blood. But after a while, he let go because the hand was needed elsewhere, and bubbles burst to the surface of his guts.

Eldon fell back into the memory of those tangential moments of his life. Prison-colony memories, bitter but also sweet, ginger mixed with lime, kerosene with essence of vanilla. The heat of a body was the same in all the worlds, it seemed.

THE END.  
19 April 2006

At LJ: http://lobelia321.livejournal.com/436632.html  
This page: http://archiveofourown.org/works/184373


End file.
